A Lavenham man who stalked a woman after their relationship ended and left malicious messages at her workplace saying she was rude and took cocaine has been sentenced.

Tobias Watson of Prentice Street, Lavenham was given a 24-month community order after admitting to stalking a woman at Suffolk Magistrates’ Court on Thursday, August 1.

His victim said she left her home as she did not feel safe and in a "position of jeopardy" after a number of complaints were made to her work.

The offence is said to have taken place between mid-January and February this year and the court heard Watson and the woman started a brief relationship in December of last year.

The victim said she felt he was assertive and felt uncomfortable, so she told him it was over, the court heard.

But she began receiving a lot of messages from him and so decided to block him but when she returned home from her place of work in London a few days later he turned up at her address, the prosecutor said.

He came in and said he had consumed drugs and was clearly agitated and the victim said she was concerned he was watching her house.

Watson left but later called her many more times and harassed her in public.

The victim said her place of work then got a complainant naming her and saying she had been rude and she was told by HR they would be taking the complainant seriously.

This happened two more times, with complainants claiming she was intoxicated and taking cocaine.

She explained the pain this behaviour had caused her: “His behaviour made me feel deeply uncomfortable.

“I felt physically unsafe and I felt my words didn’t matter enough to make him stop.

“He would invalidate my feelings making them seem irrelevant and even after he was arrested and told not to contact me on bail didn’t get better.

“I moved to my parents’ house as I didn’t feel safe in my own home. It was my refuge and Toby took that away from me.”

She added: “I was left feeling lots of stress around my work and I felt my position was in jeopardy.

“I suffer from depression and anxiety this and I feel like he played on that.”

In mitigation the court heard Watson also suffers from depression and that he takes full responsibility for what happen and wishes he could take it back.

He was sentenced to a 24-month community order, with 40 programme days on building relationships and 60 hours unpaid work, subjected to a restraining order and ordered to pay the victim £500 in compensation.